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Pattaya Trader<br />
E-Mail: pattayatrader@pattayatrader.com<br />
Who Do You Contact for Financial<br />
Over the years I have written many articles on the<br />
above subject.<br />
Advice Offshore ?<br />
The main thrust has always been to try and find<br />
a long established financial adviser who has a few<br />
attributes that make it conducive for you to do business with him.<br />
When you meet a broker canvassing for your business here<br />
are a few questions you should put to him to help determine if he is<br />
right for you.<br />
How long have you been in the business and who have you<br />
worked with? If he’s had 20 years experience selling double glazing<br />
and two pushing investments then perhaps you should look further.<br />
What basic financial qualifications do you have and where<br />
were they obtained?<br />
All is not lost with this individual if he has no certificates as you<br />
may consider that the biggest rouges in financial history have been<br />
dripping in financial qualifications.<br />
However in reality if your potential broker does not have a<br />
basic financial planning qualification it may be best that you keep<br />
looking.<br />
In a non regulated environment like Thailand it is very important<br />
that your adviser has a base here, owns property here and<br />
perhaps has a wife and child here.<br />
The main reason for this is self evident. If your broker has no<br />
commitment to Thailand what level of service do you really expect<br />
after he has been paid his commission.<br />
Try also and avoid drunks. Yes they operate here and despite<br />
the confidentiality of offshore investing it is not much good when<br />
your broker gets drunk. What do they say about a drunk can never<br />
keep a secret?<br />
The most obvious thing never to do is give any money to a<br />
broker here. If you do then no one will sympathise with you when<br />
you lose it all.<br />
Some financial advice from David Thrifty<br />
I have always cautioned against using International banks<br />
mainly because the only time they will want to meet up with<br />
you is when you have more money to invest.<br />
But now comes the news that HSBC has been fined 10.5<br />
million pounds for miss-selling investment bonds to elderly<br />
people in care. HSBC will pay 29 million compensation and said<br />
it was “profoundly sorry”<br />
The problem for HSBC is that they made more in commission<br />
from selling these bonds to people with a couple of years<br />
to live than the fine that has been imposed.<br />
Heres how their scam worked.<br />
Elderly customers paid a 5% up front charge for the investments<br />
followed by 1% a year.<br />
Average investment size was 115,000 and many of the<br />
elderly were reliant on this to pay their care bills<br />
They were recommending that people invest in these<br />
products for at least five years. However because many had a<br />
life expectancy of less than five years they started to withdraw<br />
from the investments sooner than expected.<br />
The combination of withdrawals and charges meant that<br />
capital was eaten away quicker than should have been the case<br />
if the investments had been sold properly.<br />
The bank then made the following statement.<br />
“This should not have happened and I am profoundly<br />
sorry that it did. We have high values here at HSBC and this<br />
runs contrary to everything that we stand for. That is why when<br />
we suspected that everything was not right we took action”<br />
That is all very well of course but it is hard to stomach that<br />
a company which globally reported pre tax profits of 11 Billion<br />
dollars for the first six months of 2011 finished the year being<br />
fined for ripping off pensioners getting ready to die.<br />
Page 58 For Advertising Call 038 716 390 (Thai) - 038 716 986 (Eng) Issue 136 - February 2012<br />
Is it any wonder the Occupy Wall Street protestors are out on<br />
the street?<br />
And there not the only bank in the rip off business.<br />
Coutts bankers to the Queen fined 6.3 million sterling for<br />
selling AIG bonds as low risk.<br />
Credit Susisse fined 5.95 million sterling for advice failures<br />
when selling complex financial products.<br />
The problem for me is that when any investment company<br />
cheats its clients some of the bad publicity rubs off on all brokers<br />
including myself who has tried to be honest with our clients over<br />
the past fifteen years here in Thailand.<br />
The “High Standards” professed by HSBC have always been<br />
endemic within our brokerage. The difference is that we practice<br />
them.<br />
David.thrifty@yahoo.com<br />
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http://www.pattayatrader.com<br />
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